Concerns grow as 600 go on hunger strike in Bahrain

Six-hundred Bahraini prisoners have been on hunger strike for nine days to protest against being tortured in a prison, says the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR).

In report on Friday, the rights group voiced “concern over the reports of prisoners’ hunger strike at the Dry Dock detention center in protest against ongoing torture and ill-treatment in detention.”

The group quoted the prisoners as saying they suffered from “different types of ill-treatment including beatings, insults, deprivation from using the toilets, being locked in their cells at all times, insulting their sect, torture, solitary confinement, and being forced to stand for long hours.”This is not the first time that Bahrain’s pro-democracy activists have gone on a hunger strike. Dozens of similar strikes have been staged at the Dry Dock and Juw prisons since 2010.

The BCHR estimates that at least 3,000 people are held in detention in the Persian Gulf country.

On June 10, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) censured the Manama regime for human rights violations in the country. A total of 46 members of the international body expressed deep concern over the Al Khalifa regime’s crackdown on peaceful protesters.

Since mid-February 2011, thousands of pro-democracy protesters have held numerous demonstrations in the streets of Bahrain, calling for the Al Khalifa royal family to relinquish power.

On March 14, 2011, troops from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates invaded the country to assist the Bahraini government in its crackdown on peaceful protesters.